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The 'fraud and abuse' thing has me riled...

All you Trump aficionados out there hailing DOGE chainsaw efforts need to give me a little help. I do know how to run a chainsaw and I respect a chainsaw.

The chainsaw analogy is overblown.

The excuse I am hearing for all this chainsaw wielding is “fraud and abuse”.

Excuse me if I roll my eyes right here. I have heard these claims in Idaho. Fraud and abuse.

Abuse is evil and bad, I agree, but fraud is a crime. Here’s the Idaho code. I’m sure there are federal codes for defrauding the federal government too. We have a State Attorney General. We have a US Attorney for Idaho.

If people are committing crimes against the rest of us, who pay taxes and follow the law, why the hell aren’t our elected prosecutors prosecuting them? Should we take a chain saw to these slackers?

Instead, we hear all these claims of ‘fraud and abuse’ and somehow think these fraud and abuse claims justify retribution. Is there something else behind these claims?

Let’s go to court.

Let’s sort this out.

At a recent Health and Welfare Board meeting we got told that a program supporting families caring for their disabled members at home would be discontinued. The Directors statement to us justifying this was because the Department had found evidence of ‘fraud and abuse’.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I do understand there are people out there who will abuse any system we build. People will steal water. People will park where they shouldn’t. People will litter. And we should shame them, even prosecute them.

But to shut down a program that has been helping families on the ‘fraud and abuse’ excuse tips me over.

Show me the fraud.

Prosecute it, damn it.

So, I asked our director at that board meeting 6 months ago, “Have there been any cases referred to the State Attorney General? Are we prosecuting this fraud?”

He deferred.

He will move on to serve a broader sphere. I have not read of any prosecutions by our Attorney General. Please, let me know.

Are we just using this ‘fraud and abuse’ smear as an excuse for the new age lynching of cutting off promised funds and employment? Are we stopping helping people because there are some slackers? If there are fraudsters, prosecute. We have laws.

We can do better.

People need to be honest. And they need to fear if their behavior is dishonest.

We have a place here in town to drop off yard waste instead of driving 5 miles out of town. It is a wonderful service. And it is abused.

I took a video of a commercial landscaper dumping his 5-yard trailer at the site and sent it to our mayor.

Last week I watched and scowled at people dumping on the pavement what they could have thrown their clippings in the bins.

If we make things easy for people, people abuse it.

Abuse is not fraud. Abuse deserves our approbation. Please feel free with me to look at, make eye contact with folks abusing the systems that are here to serve all of us. They deserve the shame.

But fraud is a crime. To lump it in with “abuse” is giving the prosecutors a free ride. Fraud means the perpetrator got money through their falsehoods. Fraud needs to be prosecuted.

DOGE is not prosecuting. DOGE is wielding a chainsaw.

Prosecution enforces the rule of law. Our government appointed law enforcers should prosecute those who take our taxpayer dollars through deceit.

We are on the cusp of turning this government ‘of the people, by the people, for the people’ into a government that now rewards those in power.

My glaring at abusers at our yard waste dump is not enough.

It will take more effort to show that we believe this republic is worth saving.